 "Peyush Bansal, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, Lenskart")
Lenskart cofounder and Chief Executive Officer Peyush Bansal is betting on artificial intelligence (AI) to accelerate growth as India’s largest eyewear retailer prepares for an initial public offering (IPO) in November — building on a decade of technology investments in supply chains and remote eye testing. The company is seeking a valuation of up to $8 billion.
The company, which turned profitable in 2024–25 (FY25) after years of losses, is deploying AI-based eye tests in overseas markets and expanding remote testing across India to reach underserved areas. Bansal said AI will be central to Lenskart’s goal of eventually serving 1 billion customers. “Now, with the next wave of innovation through AI — and we’re experiencing it ourselves — there has been so much development in the last year,” Bansal told Business Standard. “We’re already conducting AI-driven eye tests in foreign markets, and in India, we’ve massively scaled remote testing to reach even the remotest parts of the country.”
He said the company is ready to take the next step in creating impact — the kind of transformation companies like Amazon, Netflix, and Microsoft achieved after going public. The IPO comes amid a record year for Indian market debuts but also heightened volatility. Lenskart plans to raise up to $830 million in what would be India’s fifth-largest offering of 2025.
The company posted a ₹297 crore profit on ₹6,652 crore in revenue in FY25 after turning earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation-positive three years earlier. Profit before tax has also been positive for the past two years.
By 2030, nearly 1 billion people in India are expected to need vision correction, but fewer than 40 per cent are projected to wear prescription glasses — a gap Lenskart hopes to fill.
“Our North Star metric right now is how many eye tests we’re conducting,” said Bansal. “India needs about 100 million eye tests a year from a company like Lenskart to start making a meaningful impact. In that journey, what matters is keeping our unit economics sustainable — and I think they’re looking promising right now.”
The company reported a net profit of ₹62 crore in the April–June quarter (Q1) of 2025, compared with a ₹11 crore loss a year earlier. Operating revenue rose 25 per cent to ₹1,894 crore in Q1 of 2025-26 (FY26) from ₹1,520 crore in the same period last year.
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Lenskart is investing heavily in eye-testing infrastructure and manufacturing in India. With only 30–35 optometrists per million people, the company uses technology — including centralised remote testing — to boost capacity twofold to threefold per optometrist.
Bansal said that 10 years ago, Lenskart aimed to serve 50–100 million people, a target it is now close to achieving.
The SoftBank-backed firm competes with Titan EyePlus, VisionExpress, Warby Parker, and Italian eyewear giant Luxottica Group. Asked about Lenskart’s edge, Bansal pointed to technology and customer experience over capital.
“What we must do is leverage our strengths in talent, culture, and technology — and continue to obsess over customer experience,” he said.
Lenskart plans to add 450 stores this financial year (FY26) — its fastest expansion in three years — taking its total to more than 3,150 outlets across 14 countries, according to sources.
The company is also developing Unified Payments Interface-enabled smart glasses and has invested in AjnaLens, a deeptech startup specialising in extended reality and AI-powered wearables. Partnering Ajna and Qualcomm, Lenskart is building hardware, software, and firmware in India to create locally relevant smart eyewear.
“We’re taking a longer-term bet here,” said Bansal. “I think India is now ready to build world-class hardware, software, and firmware for this category.”
The company’s selling shareholders include cofounders Peyush Bansal, Neha Bansal, Amit Chaudhary, and Sumeet Kapahi, along with investors such as SoftBank and Kedaara. Bansal stressed that the offering represents only a small portion of shares and is not an exit for shareholders.
An alumnus of IIM Bangalore and McGill University, Bansal worked at Microsoft before founding Lenskart in 2008, when selling eyewear online seemed far-fetched. The company launched online operations in 2010, when India’s e-commerce scene was still in its infancy. Reflecting on the journey, he credited persistence and focus for Lenskart’s rise.
“That persistence — that focus on solving the problem, cutting out the noise, staying grounded in our purpose, and building a strong, curious team — has been the key,” said Bansal.
